A word of thanks to you all for the informative and helpful questions and answers here.
I ordered a 9020MT and parts on the cheap side to see if I can get everything working first (or third) time around. As the pudding gets proofed, I'll upgrade where indicated.
The building guides and OS installation guides are amazements - I'm a tech writer, and don't often see writing of this quality out in the pro IT world.
gurnemanz
The User Builds and also the Golden Builds forum started out as a way to share a little about your hardware choices and unique features of your completed system with the rest of the community. Originally, they didn't include a fully detailed, start to finish install and post install guide for that hardware. You can thank Stork and the other Tonymacx86 admins for coming up with this unique idea about 10 years ago. They set up the standards and the Template to be followed for a write up to qualify to be posted here. There's really nothing else like it I've seen on the internet. Just take a brief look at the thousands of hackintosh tutorials on Youtube and you'll see that the majority of them will not get you a working/usable build if you follow them. There is much misinformation and even links to questionable macOS download sources that you really don't want to use. Best to avoid mixing in techniques/methods from any of those you'll see posted on Youtube.
This OptiMac Golden Build is the first pre-built system to qualify as a Golden Build. I decided to post it because there were really no good guides for those that wanted a low cost, easy to hackintosh PC that they didn't have to build from individual parts. Many don't have 1000 dollars plus to invest in the latest and greatest hardware or the time to put it all together for a working hackintosh. This is an easy way to get started and have success without a major investment of time and money, two things we could all use more of. I also like the fact that using a refurbished pre-built system extends the working lifespan of hardware that already exists. It helps somewhat to reduce the amount of e-waste that is created by purchasing new parts.
The reason these posts are so important is the finicky nature of a hackintosh. One kext installed to the wrong folder, one missing driver and your system just won't boot properly. It's why so much detail is required in an instructional guide. When you look at what happens when you install Windows 10 for example, it's easy to see just how much time and effort Microsoft spends on making that OS work with every possible piece of hardware from any manufacturer. You simply boot from the install USB or DVD, Windows automatically formats your hard drive, it installs Windows, reboots and automatically finds drivers once you connect to the internet. Makes everything incredibly easy for the end user.
A Mac that Apple sells will only include a very limited set of hardware that is compatible with macOS. You might replace a wifi card with one that's not officially supported and your Macbook Pro will have no internet connection. With a Windows laptop you can install any Intel based Wifi card and make it work with little effort. There are no Intel based Wifi adapter cards that currently work with macOS. That may change soon but for now the choices are extremely limited. Another example is Intel integrated graphics. Pretty much any Intel integrated graphics created since 2011 will work in Windows 10. In Catalina, currently only HD4000, 4600, 5000, a few Iris Pro versions and the latest HD530/UHD630 are fully supported. Apple just doesn't support any of the lower end integrated graphics options in their code.
So I welcome you and everyone to participate and share the unique findings that you make as you work on your Dell Optiplex hackintosh. We are all about research and collaboration here. People discover new things, post here and others then comment and help them do and learn even more than they could do by themselves. As I said previously, I've not seen anything else this good on the internet. That's why I participate and contribute here, I've gotten so much of value from this community. It's really worth signing in every day and staying up on the latest developments.
